Well over a hundred people dressed in white gathered at the CN Centre parking lot to get doused in colour for the Prince George Hospice Palliative Care Society’s (PGHPCS) annual colour walk.
“This is the first time since 2019 that we are able to gather again and celebrate our fourth hospice colour walk. After COVID hit we kind of had to change things and we had to go virtual,” explained Sandra Kimm, hospice’s special events coordinator.
Despite the hiatus an eager crowed assembled to participate in-person and “Celebrate Life with Colour”.
Participants walked a designated route as different ‘colour teams’ threw clouds of coloured powered on the crowd.
“Today we are here because we care about hospice and probably most of you are here because someone you love and someone you care about had the kind of support that our family had at hospice. At the very worst time of our lives, hospice gives us the opportunity to have some degree of peace and care and love,” said MLA Shirley Bond who spoke at the start of the event.
Bond lost her husband Bill in the summer of 2020.
“I remember when our family was there, we would either be sitting, laughing or playing music and sometimes we would go ‘shhh’ but the hospice team said ‘no’ that’s what this is about, this is your chance to care for one another in these days.”
Bond said she was grateful that hospice provided her family with a place of safety and comfort during such a difficult time.
The UHNBC drummers also opened the event by performing the Woman’s Warrior song and the Men’s Healing song.
UHNBC drum group leader Wesley Mitchell explained why these two songs were especially significant for this year’s Colour Walk.
“We have one of our drum group members whose sister is waiting to get into hospice right now so when gatherings like this happen it means the world to so many people,” said Mitchell.
“Then we are going to sing the Men’s Healing song which is very deep and sentimental to me. My uncle Ron was in Hospice House and he passed on because of multiple myeloma – cancer – in 2018 so we are bringing the spirt today for the ones that we’ve lost and the ones that are about the enter the spirit world and just for every heartbeat here today.”
For the entire month of May, close to 250 individuals and teams also participated in the ‘Walk a hundred K in the month of May’ campaign in support of hospice.
The UHNBC drummers invited one participant Jim Terrion, who is known for his passionate Terry Fox fundraising work over the years, to perform with them to celebrate his achievement of walking an impressive 1,612 kilometers during the month of May.
Once the walk got underway, it only took a few moments before there wasn’t a clean white t-shirt to be found in the sea of people walking the route.
The PGHPCS will use the money raised from the Colour Walk to help build a Rec Room - where people can gather to share their grief.
Different from traditional grief support, the focus of the Rec Room is to develop new instrumental grief programs where those using the space will connect through various activities such as woodworking, crafting, or playing games.
